Magazine binder



A. F. BROOK MAGAZINE BINDER Dec. 17, 1957 Filed Apfil 14. 1955 I X Illn- INVENTOR.

ARTHUR F. BROOK l9 l4 IE:

ATTORN EY ire States fiatent Ofihce 2,815,553 Patented Dec. 17, 1957 MAGAZINE BINDER Arthur F. Brook, Poughkeepsie, N. Y.

Application April 14, 1955, Serial No. 501,259

1 Claim. (Cl. 129-38) The invention disclosed in this patent application relates to binders for magazines, pamphlets, newspapers and the like.

Objects of the invention are to provide a binder having improved means whereby a plurality of magazines or the like, as those constituting a number of successive issues of a periodical, may be securely bound in place one alongside another, and a binder having its said securing means so constructed .and arranged as to permit easy and quick insertion of a magazine or the like and equally easy and quick removal of a magazine or the like previously secured in place in the binder.

Particular objects of the invention are to provide a binder in which the construction and arrangement of said securing means are such that according as any particular magazine desired to be removed from the binder is at or nearer an end of a stack of magazines then in the binder than to the opposite end of said stack, the magazine to be removed can be taken out of the binder Without the necessity of temporarily removing adjoining magazines and even without troublesome disturbance of any magazine in the stack, and a binder in which there is included in said securing means a pair of conveniently and readily manipulable devices either one of which may be selected for use not only to condition the said securing means to permit removal of a desired magazine but also to afford greatest ease of magazine removal according to the location of the magazine to be removed and according to the one of said devices appropriately selected for use.

Other important objects of the invention are to provide a binder having in terms of the sum of the thicknesses of the various magazines at any one time in the binder, a markedly increased binding capacity as compared with binders equipped with previously proposed types of securing means for the magazines in the binder, and a binder with elements of said securing means so disposed and arranged that the various parts of said means can be exceedingly light in weight yet of adequate strength for dependably holding quite massive magazines, books and the like in the binder.

Further special objects of the invention are to provide a binder wherein, with said securing means of the kind including a plurality of holding strips or blades each to be entered between the pages of a magazine or the like to be secured in the binder, said blades may be very thin so as considerably to assist in making possible the aforesaid increased capacity of the binder, while also minimizing or preventing possibility of distortion damage to magazine or book pages because of interposition between such pages of said blade, and a binder, also, in which, for the insertion of one or more magazines or the like or for the removal of one or more thereof from the binder, there is no necessity for bending any blade so .as to deform the same and, indeed, no necessity for making any blade of resilient material.

Another important object of the invention is to pro vide a binder having securing means as above, yet a securing means such that said blades are laterally reversible,

so that any blade may be disposed with either of its long edges uppermost, according as the magazine or the like be tween the pages of which said blade is interposed has a thicker or thinner back, thereby to adapt the binder to hold magazines, catalogs or the like having thick or thin backs.

Further particular objects of the invention are to provide a binder of a simple, low cost construction, and a binder made up of a relatively few, inexpensive and readily asembled parts.

Other desirable objects and novel features of construction and combination and relation of parts through which the purposes of the invention are attained, are set forth and will appear more fully in the course of the following specification.

The drawing accompanying and forming part of the specification illustrates a present commercial embodiment of the invention, but structure may be modified and changed as regards the immediate illustration, all within the true intent and scope of the invention as hereinafter defined and claimed.

Fig. l in the drawing is a plan view of the binder, looking down on the same as from the top of Fig. 2;

Fig. 2 is a broken transverse section as on the plane of line 22 of Fig. 1;

Fig. 3 is a broken end elevation of the binder with a stack of magazines or the like secured therein;

Fig. 4 is a fragmentary perspective view of the binder and magazine stack therein, showing a magazine in course of being removed from the binder;

1 Fig. 5 is an enlarged detail view, showing an end of one of the holding blades.

Broadly considered, the invention comprises a temporary binder having a cover 10 consisting of sides 11 and 12 and a connecting back 14, with the back carrying a securing means for a stack of magazines or the like and with said securing means including a mount 15 secured to the back at each end of the latter, a slide rod 16 for coaction with spaced guides on each mount, and a plurality of holding blades 17 apertured near opposite ends for being strung between said rods, so that, with say one of the blades inserted between the pages of each of a plurality of magazines such as indicated at 18, the rods 16 coact with the mounts 15 to keep the blades strung to maintain the magazines in a stack as shown in Fig. 3, and so that, also, as will be explained, one rod or the other may be endwisely partially withdrawn from its mount to free a selected end of a selected one or more of the blades 17 thereby to permit quick and easy addition to the stack or removal therefrom of one or more magazines in a manner which will be explained.

The mounts 15 are shown as identical, with each in the form of a U-shaped bracket, bent into U-shape from a cutofi length of strip material, which material may con veniently be thin sheet metal, as brass or steel, of standard width and gauge strip stock.

The main centrol lengths of the bracket mounts 15 are shown as secured, as by means of two rivets for each as indicated at 19, to the ends of the back 14, with both said main lengths extending across its back at right angles to the direction of length thereof.

Each bracket mount 15 is further shown as having a pair of relatively short end lengths 20 and 21, each of the same size and each bent at right angles to the said main central length. Thus, when the bracket mounts are secured to the back 14 as described, said end lengths 20 and 21 constitute upstanding U-legs as shown in the drawing, said legs to provide the spaced guides aforesaid.

Said legs are suitably apertured to allow for endwise insertion of a slide rod 16 through both said legs of each bracket mount 15, and each slide rod is shown as constituted by a major length of a piece of round rod metal stock, with a lesser length of said piece rectangularly olfset to provide a handle 22. The apertures just referred to are preferably such as to allow merely for an easy sliding fit of the slide rods, except that in the case of the apertures in the legs 21 these apertures are desirably enlarged, to an extent to avoid interfering with easy up-tilting of a slide rod 16, indicated in Fig. 4.

The assembly of the parts as shown is such that one of the two bracket mounts is reversely placed relative to the other, so that, with respect to the inner face of the back 14, one Ll-leg is diagonally opposite the other, and consequently one U-leg 21 is diagonally opposite the other. It is also to be noted that in the assemby as shown the slide rods 16 are so present that their handles 22 are diagonally opposite each other, with the result that one handle is at one side of the back 14 and the other handle is at the other side of the back 14.

In order normally to retain the two slide rods 16 as shown in Fig. 1, that is, to have both said rods in the apertures of the U-legs 20 as well as in the apertures of the U-legs 21, and to have the handles 22 parallel with each other and with the plane of the back 14, spring clips 23 are shown as provided for resiliently yieldably seizing the handles 22 when the latter are positioned as in Fig. I. Said clips are shown as formed integral with the U-legs 21, and in that case said legs would desirably be of resilient material as spring steel. It will be noted from the directions of extension of the rods 16 as seen in Fig. 1 that the apertures in the U-legs 20 and 21 of each bracket mount 15 are in a line offset from the center line ofthe bracket mount, and that the two clips 23 are shown as struck outwardly from the upper portions of the U-legs 21 at subdivisions of the widths of the latter suitably spaced from the apertures of these U-legs for the slide rods 16.

The blades 17 are desirably of metal, and preferably of very thin gauge steel, and near each end, as shown in the case ofone of the ends of the blade 17 illustrated in Fig. 5, each blade 17 is provided with an aperture, such as that marked 24 in Fig. 5, which is offset from the center line of the blade and somewhat elongated in the direction of length of the blade.

When, for example, it is desired at any one time to secure in the binder a number of magazines or the like sufiicient to fill the binder, such as indicated in Fig. 3 in the case of the seven magazines there shown, either one of the slide rods 16 may be selected for manipulation to provide what may be called the working slide rod. Said working slide rod is manipulated at its handle 22, so as to snap said handle free from its spring clip 23, and then endwisely to move the slide rod to disengage an end thereof from the associated U-leg 20 and to withdraw said rod from the blades 17, thus to leave said blades still locked in the assembly because attached at one end to the other slide rod. Desirably starting with the magazine which is to be nearest to the handle of the working slide rod when the latter has been returned to normal position, and consequently starting with the blade 17 nearest said handle, said blades are inserted one after another into one magazine after another, all with their backs lowermost, so as to be interposed between the pages of the magazines above the backs of the same. Desirably also, as each magazine is thus strung on a blade, the working slide rod is advanced an appropriate further amount toward the associated U-leg 20 and the lastnamed blade is restrung on said rod; and so on, until, with the last of the seven magazines 18 strung on the seven blades of 17 of Fig. 3 and with all said blades strung at both ends between the two slide rods, and with the working slide rod again extended through both the associated U-legs 20 and 21, the handle of said rod can be swung down for seizure by its spring clip 23, thus securely to lock all the magazines in the binder. It will be noted that while seven blades 17 are shown in Figs. 3 and 4, only six thereof are shown in Figs. 1 and 2; but these differences are merely to indicate that the binder may be furnished with as many blades as desired in the assembly as made at the factory, in combination with one or more loose extra blades for use when necessary, as where the binder is purchased for use in connection with a certain periodical and several issues of the same have so many less pages than usual that the current binder may accommodate an unusually large number of issues.

When, with the binder already holding one or a plurality of magazines or the like to a total less than its full capacity, it is desired to add another magazine, one only of the slide rods 16 is used, with the selection of that rod depending on whether the magazine to be added is to be placed on one side or the other of the magazine of the magazines already in the binder.

In Figs. 3 and 4, some of the blades 17 are illustrated as higher up than others on the slide rods 16; as will be understood, those are so strung on said rods that the long edge 25 of the blade nearer to the apertures 24 at each end of the blade is lowermost, while the blades 17 shown as lower down on the slide rods 16 are so strung on said rods that the long edge 26 of the blade, more remote from said apertures 24 than the long edge 25 of the blade, is lowermost. The blades thus hung higher on the slide rods 16 are particularly adapted for the holding of. magazines having a larger number of leaves forming a thicker backing, than magazines which would be held best by the blades hung lower on said slide rods. Where it is found advisable, due to the physical characteristics of a particular magazine to be secured in the binder by a particular blade 17, to reverse that blade, this may readily be done, except that, of course, both slide rods 16 would have to be used, conveniently one after the other, incidental to effecting such reversal.

Especially where the successive issues of the same periodical are to be added to the binder one after another as received, a very satisfactory arrangement would be provided with the blades 17 strung so as to have higher placed blades in regular alternation with lower placed blades, as illustrated in Figs. 3 and 4; thus obviating the need to reverse any blade and so never requiring more than one slide rod to be manipulated incidental to adding another magazine to the binder, while with the blades thus staggered the various magazines can be squeezed closer together than would otherwise be possible and at the same time there could be perfectly aligned the upper edges of their pages and such alignment held as a consequence of said squeezing.

Removal of a particular magazine or the like from the binder is likewise quick and easy, since for this purpose also only one of the slide rods need be manipulated. The slide rod selected to be the working slide rod would be the one having its handle 22 farther away from the magazine to be removed than the handle of the other slide rod. The reason for this will be understood and is made clear in Fig. 4. Here the magazine or the like at the extreme left is illustrated in course of removal. Said working slide rod is the one seen in this view in side elevation, the same being uptilted to permit removal therefrom of an end of the blade 17 which holds said magazine in thebinder. Said blade is shown swung up from the back 14 and away from the working slide rod, to permit slip-01f of said magazine from said blade. All thereafter to be done is to lower said blade and said working slide rod, string the blade at its aperture 24 again on the slide rod, endwisely advance the latter into its U-leg 21 and swing down the handle 22 for seizure by its spring clip 23.

Where a magazine to be removed is not an end one of a stack, even so for its removal only one slide rod 16 need be manipulated. Here, too, the slide rod selected to be the working one would be the one nearer the magazine to be removed; except that if the magazine to be removed is midway in a stack, neither slide rod would be preferred over the other, and either alone could be used.

Thus it will be seen that except where for some special reason it is desired laterally to reverse a blade 17, all blades may be maintained always interconnected in the assembly, as to each blade at least at one end thereof; that insertion or removal of one or more magazines or the like from the binder is quick and easy, regardless of the placement in the binder of any such magazine, and

in every instance merely by manipulation of one only of the two slide rods; it being noted that, because the apertures 24 are slots elongated in the direction of length of the blades, a blade end may be readily unstrung from a slide rod even when the placement in the binder of a magazine desired to be removed is such that said blade while acting as the holder of said magazine is at a location along said rod considerably spaced from the rod end remote from its handle 22.

Not only are all the blades 17 duplicates, but so also are the two bracket mounts 15, as are the slide rods 16 with their integral handles 22. All of these parts are fabricable at very little cost and from tools inexpensive to construct. The blades may be exceedingly thin, and comparatively light stock may be used for the bracket mounts and the slide rods, yet the securing means in the binder kept exceptionally strong; while the coaction of the parts in the binder is such that, the extreme convenience in use as hereinabove explained is made possible.

The elongated slots 24 prevent the bars 17 from binding on the rods 16 when not exactly at right angles thereto. These slots afford suflicient leeway for the bars to be out of parallel and facilitate removal and replacement operations where parts necessarily are more or less out of line, as indicated in Fig. 4.

What is claimed is:

Binder for magazine comprising a back, U-shaped brackets having short parallel side portions connected by flat intermediate base portions, said base portions being secured to said back in parallel relation at opposite ends of the back to thereby support said side portions of the brackets in upstanding relation on the back, said brackets being of springy material, said side portions of each bracket having aligned openings therethrough, one side portion of each bracket being cut down from the upper edge at one side of the opening therein to form a spring finger and said spring finger being bent outward away from said side portion in the form of an integral spring clip, magazine holding blades having slots in the ends of the same located between the side portions of the brackets, rods extending through the openings in the brackets and through said slots in said blades, said rods having angularly bent ends forming handles engageable in said spring clips when said rods are rotated after insertion of the same through said openings and slots in the blades, said brackets being mounted on the back with the spring clip of one bracket at one side of the back and the spring clip of the other bracket at the other side of the back and whereby magazines may be removed from and replaced in the binder at either side of a group of magazines in the binder by turning the handle of one or the other of said rods to release it from the clip holding the same.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 432,735 Helm July 22, 1890 548,615 Marble Oct. 22, 1895 1,178,204 Arnold Apr. 4, 1916 1,442,620 Landon Jan. 16, 1923 2,065,341 McNaught et al. Dec. 22, 1936 2,116,798 Osuch May 10, 1938 2,157,080 Mandel May 2, 1939 FOREIGN PATENTS 440,633 Great Britain Jan. 2, 1936 

